His hand covered the money, sliding it toward himself like it might vanish. "Maybe thirty minutes. I make calls."
"Make it worth it."
The locker room was a closet with delusions—concrete walls, a bench, a bucket. Someone had scratched a Buddha into the floor. Luck or irony, I never asked.
I stripped to shorts and started wrapping my hands.
The ritual steadied me. Pull the fabric tight enough to protect bone, loose enough to keep blood moving. Three times around the wrist. Between each finger. Over the knuckles. Again.
My hands looked like weapons when I finished.
They were weapons.
St. Paul's had made certain of that. We'd trained in everything—boxing, Muay Thai, Krav Maga, Sambo, whatever the instructors decided would make us more efficient killers. Beatings disguised as education. Pain reframed as privilege.
I'd excelled.
Not through talent, though I had that. Through understanding that winning meant survival. Losing meant things worse than death.
So, I'd never lost.
Not once in that place. Not once since.
Heavy footsteps echoed down the hall.
I looked up as the door opened.
The man had to duck. Six-eight, easy. Two-ninety, most of it earned through violence rather than gyms. His left side was scarred—burn tissue covering half his face, running down his neck and disappearing under his shirt. His arms were massive. Twice mine, easy.
Russian. The scars looked like Grozny.
He saw me and growled. Actually growled, guttural and low.
I grinned and blew him a kiss.
His face darkened.
Good. Angry fighters made mistakes.
The promoter appeared behind him, vibrating. "This is Dmitri. Moscow. Very experienced. Very ..." He gestured at the man's size. "Big."
"Perfect."
Thirty minutes later, we stood across from each other.
The crowd had doubled. Word traveled fast—the American who never loses versus some Russian monster nobody knows. Money changed hands in thick stacks. Voices climbed over each other.
I rolled my shoulders. My spine cracked.
The promoter climbed into the ring with his microphone, working through his pre-fight theater. Names. Weights. Nationalities. The crowd screamed at "America," screamed louder at "Russia." Cold War ghosts never died, even here.
Dmitri stared at me, jaw working like he was chewing bone.
I stared back and felt nothing.
That was the trick. Most fighters came in with something to prove—ego, pride, the need to be seen as dangerous. I'd abandoned all that at St. Paul's, along with most things that made people human.
I just wanted to hurt someone.
